Lockdown

Greetings and salutations. As some of you may have noticed on the nightly news the political situation here in Pakistan has been rather volatile over the last couple weeks. Well if you want to get nit picky it has been rather volatile ever since its inception in 1946 with many an up and down cycle. But the last couple weeks have been the most charged since President Zudari took office about a year ago. As far as I can tell the problem is that there are only a few families that tend to run things here and because of that they have been competing against each other since the country was founded (oh and they all seem to be crooks – a lot like Oklahoma).

The latest problem starts with the last ruler President Musharif (who was the Army Chief of Staff and took over in a coupe of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif [remember this name]). In an attempt to maintain his power President Musharif fired the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court which lead to a great deal of popular up roar which eventually lead to Musharif stepping down. So who to take over? The Pakistanis actually had an election where candidate Benizer Bhutto (a former Prime Minister who had been fired due to allegations of corruption) was killed in a terrorist explosion. Who do you elect after the #1 candidate has been assassinated? That’s right her husband (who had served time in jail for corruption and has been nicknamed “Mr. 10%” for his embezzling).

One of Zudari’s campaign promises was that he would reinstate the Chief Justice who got fired, but after being in office for a year he still hadn’t done so, it is believed, because that Justice might re-open the corruption charges against him. The next stellar move is while the head of the military and the Prime Minister are out of the country, the Supreme Court (with a pro Zudari Chief Justice) excludes Nawaz Sharif (here is that name again) and his brother (who was the Chief Minister for the province of Punjab) from holding political office because of their past corruption charges. The Sharif brothers then threw their political weight behind the Lawyer’s Movement, who had been screaming for the reinstatement of the Chief Justice. The Lawyer’s Movement have been coordinating this Long March that was supposed to start in Lahore and Qweta and end up in Islamabad (where your friendly local arms dealer – me) lives. In an attempt to keep the Long March for gathering steam Zudari placed a lot of people under house arrest preemptively and basically shut down the city Sunday afternoon (this kind of tactic always works right?).

The major concern was that if the protest did get into the city and/or violence erupted (which was a very good possibility) the Army might have to step in to restore order and once that happened, they would probably just kick out Zudari for being stupid in letting it all get to that point. And what do we call it when the military kicks out the president? That’s right, a coupe, which we as a government tend to frown on.

The good news is Zudari flinched first in this game of political chicken and said he would restore the Chief Justice so Sharif basically turned off the Long March and the whole thing fizzled out. The other good news is since the whole country was about to implode, the embassy was shut down and we all got the last couple days off. Granted we were in lockdown mode and restricted to our houses, but I got to sleep in late on Sunday and did a lot of reading for the Joint Professional Military Education class I am taking.

The bad news is that because of this stupid power playing I had to miss the St. Patrick’s Day party that was going on at the British High Commission (they don’t have an embassy, they have a high commission because Pakistan used to be a colony or something like that). So far since I have been here I have missed two parties at the High Commission and two parties at the Marine House (where the Marine Security Guard lives). Granted I missed some of it because I was in the States which is infinitely better, but still. I am hoping nothing else goes wonky and I can make it to the Canadian Embassy for their St. Patrick’s Day celebration next weekend.

There was another celebration since the last time we talked. Most of you probably may not have known it but last Thursday was the Profit Mohammed’s birthday. We didn’t set up a tree or anything like that but the city was strung up with lights. Here are a couple of the pictures. Since it was at night and I was shooting form a distance they might be a bit blurry, but I had to stop by the side of the street to take the pictures and due to the force protection issues here I did not want to take too long to get the shots. I think you can get the point.

The Prime Minister's Secretariate.

The Supreme Court building.

Looking down Constitution Ave.

The only other thing to report is that I have grown what some might call a mustache (others might call it a caterpillar or some other derogatory name). I started it on the 1st of March and I think it has grown in nicely. I’m not saying it looks good, only that it is rather full. The reason behind this, like most facial hair growing experiments, is that there really isn’t much else to do so some of us decided to have a contest. These are the kinds of things we in the military do on deployment to pass the time. Don’t worry friends, I doubt that the ‘stache is going to make it beyond March. We will have to see what kind of reception it gets at the Canadian Club.

A shot of me, my mustache and the C-12.

A close up shot. Don't fear the 'stache.

Well like I said before all the shenanigans have fizzled out so it is back to work for me tomorrow. Thank you all for your e-mails and other comments (except the one making fun of my mustache). I hope your days have and continue to be calmer than the Pakistani political scene. Until next time, be good. And if you can’t be good, be good at it.

Your Tax Dollars At Work

Hello all and welcome back. It’s been an interesting couple weeks since my last post. When we last left our intrepid traveler he was awaiting the plane that was going to whisk him away to the land of milk and honey that is Oxnard, Ca. The flight over wasn’t too exciting. Unfortunately since I had just flown Qatar Airlines the week before all the movies were the same so I spent most of the flight reading and trying to sleep.

I commented last time about how great the service on the flights was and how great the seats were since they fold completely flat, and while they were all that I still arrived in Washington DC completely jet lagged. Add to that the 5 hour layover in DC, and I was an absolute mess on the flight to LAX. I remember sitting down in my seat, some dude squawking on the PA, some acceleration and a sudden thump as we touched down in LA, but that is about it. It took me about 45 minutes to get my luggage and rental car. After the hour drive from LAX to Naval Base Ventura County at Port Hueneme it was about 3:30 in the morning on Sunday before I got to bed. All told that was about 26 hours of total travel. You should really try it sometime. Good times. Lots of fun.

Sunday around noon I met the program manager and the Pakistan Navy delegation in the hotel lobby, and for what you might ask; to conduct a driving tour of LA. That’s right; they wanted to drive around LA on the Sunday of the Academy Awards. So we got to spend all day driving down the Pacific Coast Highway and Sunset Boulevard. Actually it was quite pretty; a good day for a drive. The bad part was I was hoping to get together with a friend, Martha J. and do some dinner. That was kind of how the whole week went. I had to play baby sitter for the Pakistan delegation and never had a night to visit friends in the area. It was rather annoying and disappointing.

That’s not to say the whole week was a mess though. I did get to go to Universal Studios during the trip. The Program Manager put in a “culture day” where we took the delegation to see something that is American and let them sample our culture. Personally, I think it’s just an excuse for her to go site seeing, but I’m not going to look a gift horse in the mouth (as an aside, isn’t this expression from the Trojan Horse story, and wouldn’t the Trojans have been better off if they had taken a look inside? I’m just saying).

Universal was a lot of fun though I would have preferred some actual roller coasters. Pretty much all the rides are motion simulators which are fun, but you just can’t properly simulate pulling 3 G’s in a loop and 80 mph worth of wind in your hair. It just isn’t the same. I like the real thing when it comes to amusement parks. Presented now for your enjoyment are a few pictures from the day.

Me at Universal Studios.

He he he... Monkey butt.
That is a big guitar.

The Jurassic Jungle.

Donkey from Shrek. He's funny, but he can be an ass sometimes.

Say hello to my little friend.

Dude, can't you see I'm working over here.

After the Program Review was over on Friday I rolled down to San Diego for a couple days. It was nice to see all the old gang. I hope you all had fun; and for those of you I didn’t get to see, hopefully we can get together next time. Here is a picture from Friday Night.

The San Diego knuckleheads.

The biggest problem with coming down to San Diego was that my flight on Sunday back to Pakistan was out of LAX. This wasn’t really a big deal because it didn’t leave until 10:40 in the morning. The plan was to get up around 6, get on the road about 6:30 and drive back to LA which should take about two hours. With turning in my rental car I figured I would get to the airport about 8:45 which should give me plenty of time to get through the lines at the airport and make my flight with plenty of time. The problem with plans though is, as the book says, they “often go awry.” It is with this in mind then that I will tell you the tale of my trip back to Pakistan.

It started a little after 6. I had just woken up and was trying to get motivated to get in the shower when my cell phone started ringing. It was the nice folks at United who were calling to tell me that my 10:40 flight had been cancelled but they were able to book me on the 9:40 flight if I could get to the airport in time. I figured I could do it, but I had lost pretty much all of my buffer in the process. So I decided to forgo the shower, threw everything I had in my bags and took off for LA. As I was approaching Camp Pendleton traffic can to a stop and I was think oh no because the road to LA can turn into a parking lot sometimes with folks going back after the weekend. Fortunately for me (though not for someone else) there was just an auto accident and I was soon past it. I think I set a land speed record getting back to LA from that point on and thanks to GPS I made it to the rental car agency without getting lost. From there it was off to the airport. As the shuttle bus took us around the airport to the different terminals there were a couple that had security line completely out the door, so I was sweating all the way up to pulling in front of my terminal. Luckily the line was not that bad and I managed to get my boarding pass and make it through security in time. The flight from LA was fine with the exception that I think the lady sitting next to me had a cold and passed it on to me.

After a 5 hour layover in Washington DC where I got to use the Virgin Atlantic Airlines lounge (the first one I had been to in the States; pretty nice) we finally board the plane. Some of you may recall what the weather was like in Washington DC on Sunday March 2nd. For those of you who do not, let me tell you is was snowing like no bodies business. We ended up having to wait one and a half hours for the crews to come with the deice gear and another half hour for them to deice the aircraft. Add to that the slowest taxi evolution I have ever seen and you get our takeoff happening about two and a half hours late. I tried to sleep through most of the flight, but the cold I was catching made that difficult. We finally land in Doha, Qatar about 20 minutes before we are supposed to board my next flight to Islamabad. The whole ride on the bus to the terminal, I was again sweating (and not because of the fever). I ended up walking into the terminal, going through security, going straight to the ticket counter and getting right on the next flight. I barely had a chance to go to the bathroom. The good news is that I did at least make my flight. The funny thing is after chasing the clock all day and barely making it to my flights, the flight to Islamabad actually arrived 30 minutes early. This would have been good except I had to wait for my ride to get there. The one time I didn’t really want to be early was the one time I was.

Ultimately I did finally make even though I arrived with a cold. I am feeling a bit better though. Hopefully I will be better in a couple more days. Aside from that I am just trying to get settled back in to the job. I had over 2oo e-mails waiting for me when I got back and I am only now getting myself dug out from underneath them.

Well that should be enough for this installment. I do not have any trips for a bit so things should calm down some and hopefully settle into a groove. Until next time, remember if you can’t be good, be good at it.

What Time Is It?

Welcome once again to the latest installment of my continuing adventures. Like my last post I am once again waiting for a ride that will take me to Benazir Bhutto International Airport for a flight; this time to Oxnard, Ca. Taken in conjunction with just getting back on Monday from my 10 day trip to Jacksonville, Fl and staying up too late that last couple nights playing Lexulous and Mob Wars on Facebook (I knew joining that thing was going to be a bad idea) my body basically does not know where it is. I'm sure by time I land in LAX at 1 AM local time my brain will be completely short circuited. The good news is that after this trip I will have earned about 40,000 frequent flier miles (one silver lining). But I am getting ahead of myself. I still haven't told you about the last trip.

I left at 4 AM (which is when I leave tonight, or this morning or whatever). Apparently all the flights out of here heading to the States leave dark and early in the morning (somewhere between 2:30 and 4 AM) just like all the flights form the States to here leave around 10 PM. I have to say going to the States seems to suck less than the flight coming to Pakistan, and not just because of the destination. We go over this some in aviation physiology, but I can't recall the exact rational. Basically though the fact that we get to the States during the day seems to make adjusting easier than getting to Pakistan in the early morning. I think sleeping on the plane going east sets you up better and no matter what you are going to be tired when you land so landing in the evening places you closer to the local time to sleep as well.

Here is a tip for those of you that might be flying internationally in the near future. If you have the ability and/or option to get upgraded to business class, DO IT!!!! As far as I can tell there really isn't a first class, so business class is up front where all the good times are. If there is a first class I have to see it just to find out how it could get better. First when you check in you get to go to a different line which is always faster. Then you go to the lounge where they have comfy chairs and drinks (sometimes of the adult variety depending on the country) and snacks and computer access and so on and so on. The seats are huge. The flight attendant gives you a menu so you can place your meal order (yes they actually serve meals - plural) before you take off and they start serving you almost right after flight. On the Boeing 777 the seats can lay completely flat so if you sleep on your side or your stomach like I do you can actually fall asleep. If you don't feel like sleeping they have fully interactive foldout screens (not those dinky ones in the back or the headrest in front of you) with like 100 movies to choose from. After you land they take you to the terminal in a separate bus (the planes almost always park away from the terminal and you get bussed in) and again get to go to a wonderful lounge while one of the airline people clear you passport and get your next boarding pass. I tell you it is the only way to fly. Granted this was all on Qatar Airways, but I flew Emerits to Bahrain in January and it was pretty nice as well. The only bad part is when you have to make that last leg (or first if you are coming this way) on the American carrier. The American version of business is not the same and you are back with the unwashed masses for that flight. For those of you wondering, no the government does not pay for me to fly in business. It pays for the standard economy class and I pay the difference, which is not necessarily cheap, but I figure it's not like I can really spend it on anything else here and it is so worth it.

The one thing that kind of bugged me during this trip was that at Doha, Qatar before you can go to the lovely lounge I had to go through security again. This in and of itself is not that big a deal. What irked me was I had crammed everything into a carry on bag so I wouldn't have to deal with checking anything and getting it lost. When I sent my bag through the x-ray machine I had all my toiletries in it. I had all the miniature sizes and in they were in the clear zip top bag, but I also had a small set of fingernail clippers and two Mach 3 razors. For some reason the security guards felt that this was a safety concern and told me I would either have to check the bag or get rid of the items. I tossed them rather than check the bag. For next hour I tried to figure out how in the world I could possibly take over the airplane with a set of fingernail clippers and 2 Mach 3 razors and I have to say I couldn't come up with anything plausible (and I have a rather active imagination in this area - don't ask).

Don't get me wrong, I don't mind security. I think it is a great thing and absolutely necessary. What I have a problem with is the appearance of security; security for the sake of having security. It's like some of the checkpoints here. The police or guards just wave you through without even looking at you. I've seen them stop a car and be talking to the driver like they are concerned about them and another car just pulls around and drives through (like impatient people can't possibly be terrorists). Lets just say I try to keep my own guard up even after I pass a check point.

Back to the trip, I had a one night layover in DC so I got to hang out with my buddies ET, Nicole S. and Becca M. Here are a pictures to properly embarrass Nicole.

Nicole doesn't like taking pictures.

The meeting in Jacksonville was largely uninteresting. Two days of work crammed into four. I won't bore you with the details. The good part though was getting to see all the guys and gals from the gaggle in Pensacola who are now stationed there. It was great to see you all and I hope you had fun. I know I did.

The P'Cola Gaggle does like taking pictures.

I mentioned my trip to Bahrain earlier and I have not forgotten that I still owe you pictures from that trip. My plan was to bring the disposable camera I got in Bahrain and get the film developed while I was there in Jacksonville and scan them to my computer when I got back. Unfortunately that plan was gooned up by Walmart. I went in on Tuesday to drop the film off at the counter that proudly displays "One Hour Processing". When I told the lady behind the counter that I wanted to get the pictures developed the first thing she tells me is they don't do one hour photos anymore. This should have been a HUGE flag, but I was there and I had a few days to spare and she told me they would be ready on Friday. I didn't leave until Saturday, I thought to myself (more on this later) so it's no big deal. I'll just come back a get them. Friday afternoon comes and I roll in to get the pictures and the nice guy behind the counter says they don't have them and if I turned them in on Tuesday they won't be ready until Monday. Needless to say (but I will anyway) I was a tad bit miffed. I was having a very hard time expressing my displeasure while remaining civil to the guy.

I understand that the guy I was talking to now was not the lady who apparently lied to me and it wasn't his fault she didn't know what she was talking about. I really don't like yelling at the wrong folks but this kind of this really bugs me. Maybe I'm getting old and cantankerous, but it doesn't seem that hard to me. Tell me what you can do and what you can't. Give me the information and I will make the decision that works best for me and everything will be good. Granted I could have taken the camera to CVS or Ritz or anywhere else, but based on the information I was given by someone who should have known it should have worked (huff, huff, huff ... ok clam down). Anyway the net result is I had to leave Jacksonville without the pictures and my good friend Katie L. will have to mail them out to me. Hopefully they will get to me in the next couple weeks, depending on the mail.

You may recall I said I was thinking I was to fly out on Saturday. Well that is indeed what I thought and with that thought in mind I went to the airport Saturday afternoon, turned in my rental car and walked up to the check in counter. Unfortunately that is about as far as I got. I put in my confirmation number and the screen comes back at me that it can't find my reservation. I re-enter the confirmation number thinking maybe I fat figured something. Same result. I'm starting to get a bit concerned, looking at my paperwork when I notice the date in the upper corner of the screen behind the itinerary I am holding. It says Saturday 14 February 2009. The date on my itinerary said Sunday 15 February 2009. That's right I was there on the wrong date. Fortunately I was there early rather than late, missing my flight, but it was a bit embarrassing. The worse (and funniest) part was the next day I went to have lunch with a Katie and Jen T. when my friends Scott and Gena P., who I had just dinner with the night before and had said goodbye to and who thought I had already left, pulled up next to me at a traffic light. The puzzled look on Gena's face was classic even if it was at my expense.

Overall it was a fun trip. I hope this trip will be just as good. I am particularly looking forward to coming down to San Diego on Friday and Saturday. For you SD crowd, let the games begin. And for everyone remember to be good. If you can't be good, be good at it.

On The Road Again

Howdy do all. I'm so glad you could join me again for another adventure. As I write this I am actually getting ready to start a new leg. This one will take me all the way back to the States. I am waiting for the driver to pick me up to take me to the airport where I will enjoy about 18 to 20 hours in the air as I fly to Jacksonville, Fl through Doha, Qatar, then an overnight layover in DC then down to Jacksonville, Fl for a Program Management Review for the P-3 Orion aircraft the Pakistan Navy is getting from us. I'm just happy I get to come back to the States after only being here for a month, even if it is for work, only one week and I have to come back. It's better than many people here. Also, it will be nice to see all my friends who are living in JAX again.

In addition to the trip this week I am going to Oxnard, Ca or another PMR the last week in February, this time for the Harpoon Missiles they are buying from us. The cool thing on this trip is I will get to slide down to San Diego for Friday and Saturday nights and see some friends in the SoCal area. The bad thing about these trips is it takes about three to four days to get your circadian rhythm adjusted for a trip of this length. So just about the time I get used to being back in the States it will be time to come back to Pakistan. Then when I get used to being here again I roll to the States again and then it's back here. I figure by the end of the month my body is going to think it on Mars or something.

Yes I've actually been here a month. It has actually gone by very quickly. We have a couple things to mark the days since they all seem to run together. Monday is blue shirt day. Thursday is "Man Love Thursday" were everyone wears a pink shirt. Today, Saturday, is "Aloha Saturday" where, as you can probably guess, we wear Hawaiian shirts. The days seem to drag by but the next thing you know it's time to break out the Hawaiian shirt again. The other cool thing about the weekend is while we still have to come to work, we at least get to wear jeans. We have a couple other things to mark the time as well. Sundays we try to go to the auditorium they have here at the embassy and we play a movie; things like that. With all the traveling it will probably make this month go just as fast as January.

I still have not gone and done any sight seeing here in Islamabad, but I did get to do a couple flights in our C-12 the last couple weeks. So far I have been to Karachi and Kabul, Afghanistan. Unfortunately I have not left the airport, but it does get me out of the office for the day. Actually it seems kind of far to go for lunch, but it gets boring eating at the same place all the time. Now while I have not been able to stop and doing any sight seeing, I have done some drive by stuff. Presented here are some pictures for your amusement. Please for give me if some of the pictures are a bit blurry.

The Supreme Court Building.

The Prime Minister Secretariat (I think).

Flying over the mountains between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

From the ramp at Kabul. Not a whole bunch to see.

This statue was at the airport at Kabul.

Well it's time to finish packing and get ready to go to the airport. I am really looking forward to seeing several of you soon. For the rest of you please know you are in my thoughts. Until next time, remember if you can't be good, be good at it.

Turing To The Dark Side

Welcome back and greetings from Islamabad. Regretably this will probably be another short post. Things have continued to settle in. I have received all my personal property, which is nice because the cable is not working yet. It is supposed to be functional, but such is not the case. Fortunately I brought my movies so I have something to put on the TV. It was rather quiet here by myself. When I first got here there were a couple of others in the house as well (the guy I was releaving and another dude from the office). Since then they have both moved out (one to go back home and the other to a different house). So I am in this big house by myself. I don't mind too much (since I do have my movies) but since we are not supposed to drive by ourselves I have to coordinate rides to work all the time. The powers that be have decided to re-arrange the housing situation which is kind of annoying. They are giving me an assistant in the office and he gets here on the 1st and was supposed to move in here. This was going to be advantages since we would probably be on similar schedules so rides would work and he was actually born here in Pakistan so having him in the house could help with other issues if the arrive. Under the new plan though he will move in with someone else because they don't want two guys from the same shop in the same house and I will get some Army dude. I hope he is cool. Otherwise this could get old.

I have finally given in and turned to the dark side. I have resisted and resited but I just couldn't take it any more. I have finally joined Facebook. As a general principle I find all the social networking sights to be evil. I'm not exactly sure why; it's just an irrasional avertion I guess. I don't like those supermarket club things either. Perhaps it's the hermit in me. I just don't think that everyone necessarily needs to know everything about you all the time. There are just too many of my friends that are on it. I've already had the pleasure of IMing a couple of them and considering how bad I am at e-mailing maybe I will do a better job of staying in touch on a personal level this way. So if you have not already been invited to be a freind on the network it's because I didn't find you and you are cordialy invited to look me up. The big thing for me is going to be making sure I don't waist too much time on it.

The other big news (aside from selling my soul to the internet) is that I will be coming back to the States for a couple visits in February. I go to Jacksonville, Fl the second week and Oxnard, Ca the last week. The bad thing is that I will be coming back here in between the trips and my internal clock is going to he all screwed up after going, literally around the world twice in three weeks. I look forward to seeing all of you that live in those areas. Hopefully I will be able to make it down to San Diego for the weekend after Oxnard. I will be in touch with the details as I get closer.

Well that is about all for me for the moment. I know I still owe you the pictures of Bahrain and I am going to try to take some of Islamabad here soon. It's just that work takes up a lot of the day. I will try to get those to you as soon as I can. Until then feel free to look me up on Facebook and be good. If you can't be good, then be good at it.

Home Sweet Home

Assalamu alaikum (which means "Peace be unto you" in Urdu) and welcome back to my rousing adventures. Well I am slowly getting setled in. As I mentioned in my last post I managed to get here without my baggage, but I managed to get that squared away in a couple days. The only thing left was the couple boxes I shipped with some clothes. After talking to the Personal Property guys they said I could wait a few weeks for them to get a customs waiver or I could go down to the airport and talk to the customs guys in person and get it in that day. As you might expect I chose the latter. The only problem was I would have to drive to the airport.

I mentioned a bit in my last post about the strange situation that is driving in Islamabad. I haven't done too much driving myself; I have been a passanger more times than not, but I have seen a few strange things. I was going back to the airport here to fill out some paperwork so I could get the few boxes I shipped out here and there was a bit of a back up due to a traffic light being out. We were in the righ turn lane (which crosses traffic since they drive on the left side of the road here) and amid the trucks and cars was a flat bed cart being pulled by a donkey. Another morning we were going down one of the roads in town and there was a couple guys leading a camel. I've also seen horses and cows on the road. And just today I was again going to the airport, this time to fly myself, and I saw, and I'm not kidding, a guy walking a small bear. Not a shaggy dog, but a bear. I don't know where he got it but there it was. But as odd as the menagery on the road can be it is nothing compared to the people driving. The guy I releaved here said he got a call from the States from a friend who said he was feeling very low and considering suicide so he called a suicide prevention hotline. The call got out-sourced to Pakistan. When the guy told the operator he felt suicidal they got really excited and asked if he could drive a truck. It's kind of like a strage game of "Frogger". Pedestrians refuse to walk on the sidewalk (which they do actually have in places) and instead insit on walking in the streets, or worse, crossing the street right as you are coming. They will step into the road right in front of you without considering looking first. It's amazing to me that there aren't more people run over then there are. Traffic lanes here are strickly advisory in nature. Drivers often don't bother to even pick a lane and instead use them all. And if there is enough room for a car to fit it becomes a lane. We joke you have to be able to use all four lanes of a two lane road to drive. The Pakistanis are also very big proponents of car pooling You will regularly see 6-8 people in a car or a family of five on a motorcycle (dad driving, a kid on the handle bars in front, a kid behind dad, mom behind that kid sitting side-saddle and holding the baby). On the same trip as the bear sighting I saw a bus filled to over-flowing (literally). There were about 25 school kids riding on top of the bus. Personally I always wanted to ride home from school like that but they kept telling me to keep my arms and legs inside the bus. It would actually be quite impressive if they weren't trying desperately to either run you over or get run over themselves. On second thought it is less like Frogger and more like Burnout.

As I mentioned before, I got in country on the 1st and it took me about sumer and the weather was actually very nice. One thing about being a Gulf State two days to get my internal clock ajusted, so you can imagine that the last thing I really wanted to do was to take another trip. Regretably they didn't ask me and instead scheduled talks between Naval Central Command and the Pakistan Navy on the 9th in the Kindom of Bahrain. It was actually a nice trip (aside from the 6 am flight there and the 12 am flight back). Bahrain is a very small country on the Arabian Gulf and can get very hot in the summer. Fortunately it was not is that they have a good deal of oil and are by and large a very rich country. As a result they have some great building project and some wonderful architecture. Unfortunately, I suck and failed to bring my camera (I should have it sew to my sleave like a pair of mittens). I did get a disposable camera and take some pictures, but have not been able to get them developed. Hopefully I will have them for the next post.

Well that is all for the moment. Sorry there isn't more, but what can I say, there isn't much going on. Perhaps things will get more interesting (in a good way) soon. Until then, be good, and if you can't be good, be good at it.

Happy New Year!!!

Greetings from the “Land Of The Pure” which is what Pakistan means, in case you didn’t know. It’s been an interesting week or so since my last post. As you may recall, I was supposed to fly out the day after Christmas. I was all packed up and ready to go. I put my car in the storage facility and rolled to the airport. My dad drops me off, I walking to the terminal, up to the desk and tell the nice person behind the counter I am going to Islamabad with Chicago as my first stop. He comes bake to me saying probably not. For those of you who weren’t looking at the weather report for Chicago, they had a nasty ice storm on the 25th and were still crawling out from under that and were further going to be beset with fog in the evening. So I called my military travel folks and they told me that with the delays through Chicago there was no way I was going to make any of my connecting flights and the next available flight was on Tuesday the 30th. The good news thus was I got to spend a few more days in America with the folks. The bad news was I had to get a hold of the folks in Pakistan and explain why I was not going to make it. It wasn’t too big a deal since no matter how cool I am I still can’t control the weather and they understood this. The only big deal actually was that when I forwarded my new itinerary I misspelled “delayed” and the program I was using didn’t have a spell check function. The folks here found it great fun in ribbing me for this when I got here; but I am jumping ahead.

The flight, when I finally did get going, was not too bad considering I was flying half way around the world. My new itinerary allowed me to by-pass Chicago and head straight to Dullas International Airport in DC where I proceeded to have a 6 hour layover. Then there was the 13 hour flight to Dubai which is in the United Arab Emirates. I was all the way in the back which for anyone who has flown across an ocean knows is where they put all the families with small children. It actually was not too bad. I had a window seat with no one in the seat next to me, and the kids didn’t scream too much (and I got to see Wall-E three times and read most of “Odd Hours” by Dean Koontz). I was supposed to have a couple hours before flying on to Islamabad, but the plane was 40 minutes late in landing. Also, you don’t get off the plane directly into the terminal in Dubai; they bus you what seemed like a mile to the terminal. This of course took just this side of forever. Next you have to go through security again to get to the ticket counter to get your boarding pass (assuming you can find the ticket counter). The end result was that when I got to the ticket counter there only 40 minutes until the flight was supposed to take off and apparently they close boarding before that time. The guy behind the counter was very helpful in talking with his counterparts to basically hold the plane so I could get on it (he even escorted me to the gate to make sure I got there), but there was no way that my luggage was going to make it. One of the benefits of working at the embassy is that they send an “Expediter” to the airport to help you by-pass the lines at customs and get out more quickly. When I got off the plane and found the nice man holding a list with my name on it I told him that my luggage didn’t make it on to the flight and his response was, “That’s not good” which of course filled me with confidence. Ultimately I arrived in Islamabad three days later on the 1st (the other nice thing about the flight was celebrating the New Year on a plane over the Arabian Gulf) at 2 in the morning with only my coat and carry-on bag in which I had some shirts, but no underwear or socks (a tactical blunder I do not plan on repeating). It only took me two days for the rest of my bags to make it.

I am starting to get settled in. The house I’m in is nice, but there are issues with the hot water and the cable isn’t working. Also, Pakistan is having a serious shortfall in power production resulting in routine power outages. Fortunately we have a generator that kicks on automatically when the power fails. The city itself is interesting for lack of a better word. If you’ve been in a third world country before you would recognize the trash alongside the roads, the buildings that should be torn down except there are still people living there and the general brown tone that permeates everything. It’s kind of strange to see a four lane divided highway with both modern cars and donkey driven carts. It is a city living both in the 18th and 20th century (I wouldn’t say the 21st century).

Regrettably I have not been able to get out and see much of the city. All I have seen has been during the rides to work and the trip back to the airport to get my luggage and unfortunately due to force protection issues I don’t know if/when I will be able to go see anything resembling a sight. Some of you have told me you wanted me to take pictures of the house and car I am using to see the great digs I have here, but again due to force protection issues the powers that be do not want me to do this (and I kind of have to listen to them although I can tell you it is a Toyota Camry). Obviously my first concern is being safe and I do not want to jeopardize my or my roommate’s security by posting something the bad guys can use. Hopefully things will calm down here enough to be able to do at least structured excursions. I will be sure to pass along anything I get to do.

That pretty much brings you up to speed with me. I am still trying to get my internal clock reset to this new time zone (as you can see from the cool clock to the right the States are 10 – 13 hours behind Pakistan). As always, I look forward o any comments you may like to post or if you prefer you can shoot me an e-mail; it remains the same as when I was in the States. Until next time be sure to be good, and if you can’t be good, be good at it.